THE TOMBS OF THE KINGS AND ARCH-BISHOPS IN ST. AUSTIN'S ABBEY.

(Based on a Lecture given by request of the Dean in Hie CathedralGliapier House, Canterbury, on Thursday, July Qth, 1925.)

BY THE REV. R. U. POTTS, M.A., F.S.A.,BTJRSAB OF ST. AUGtTSTINE'S COLLEGE.

THE following is an attempt to give a brief collective account?of the tombs of the Kings and Archbishops in St. Augustine'sAbbey, both of those of which some remains have been found,'and of those of which a record is preserved in writing.

How the bodies of the Kings and Archbishops came to'be buried in St. Augustine's is explained in Bede's descrip-tion of the founding of the Abbey.* After mentioning the'founding of the Cathedral within the city, he goes on:—

" He (i.e., Augustine) also built a monastery not far from the'city to the eastward, in which by his advice Ethelbert erected from!the foundation the church of the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul,'and enriched it with several donations: wherein the bodies of thesame Augustine and of all the bishops of Canterbury and of theKings of I\ent might be buried."

The foundation of the monastery, according to the'Augustinian Chronicle, was begun in 598, though the churchwas- not completed at the death of Sfr. Augustine in 605.It was consecrated, according to Bede, by Augustine'fa-successor, Laurence. Its distinct function as the home ofthe monks and the royal and episcopal burial-place isdescribed at some length by Gotselin,t the monk who livedat the end of the eleventh century and has left us hisHistory of the Translation of St. Augustine, of which hewas an eye-witness in 1091. After saying that Ethelbert

* Bede, Sixf. Ecel,, i., 33. f Hist. Traits. 8. Aug., ii., 38.VOL. XXXVIII. H

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reigned in his metropolis hard by but rested here, he pro-peeds:—

" So also Augustine, his father in the faith, there hud his seat,here his resting place, there his throne, here his bed : under Christhe was the head of either church, but there he rested, here he hadhis dwelling place; there he presided, this was his own possession,there he strove, here he triumphed : there he ran his race, here hereceived .his crown, there he struggled, here as conqueror he^scended the heavenly stair . . . . there he went from strength tostrength, here he beheld the God of Gods in Sion."

The earliest narrative of the death and burial of Augus-tine in 605 is in Bede* :—

" After this (i.e., the Consecration of Mellitus and Justus) thebeloved of God. Father Augustine, died and his body was depositedwithout, close by the church of the Apostles Peter and Paul, abovespoken of, by reason that the same was not yet finished, norconsecrated, but as soon as it was dedicated the body was broughtin and decently buried in the 'north porch thereof, wherein alsowere interred the bodies of all the succeeding archbishops excepttwo only, Theod.orus and Berthwald, whose bodies are within thatchurch because the aforesaid porch could contain no more. Almostin the midst of this church (? porch or chapel) is an altar dedicatedin honour of the blessed Pope Gregory, at which every Saturdaytheir service is solemnly performed by the priest of that place.On the tomb of the said Augustine is written this epitaph—(Here rests the Lord Augustine, first Archbishop of Canterburywho being formerly sent hither by the blessed Gregory, bishop ofthe city of Rome, and by God's assistance supported with miracles,reduced King Ethelbert and his nation from the worship of idolsto the faith of Christ, and having ended the days of his office inpeace, died the 26th day of May in the reign of the same King.'"

We have no description of the original church in thechronicles, but from its remains, which we have found, it ispossible to describe it. It was nearly square, about 53 feetin length and breadth within, with an apse of unknowndimensions at the east end. It consisted of a nave 27 feetwide, with a "porticus"f or aisle on either side, and a narthex

* Bede, Hist. Eccl., ii., 3.t Portieus may mean an entrance porch or any adjunct to the main

building; such as an aisle or side chapel.

IN ST. AUSTIN'S ABBEY. 99

or ante-chapel on the west. The porticus and narthex wereof almost the same width, 11 feet. There appears to havebeen one door in the centre of the west end with a littlebuttress on each side, and it was built of the thin so-calledRoman bricks. The porticus were not of the same length:the northern one, in which was the altar of St. Gregory,seems to have been 26 feet long; the southern one, whichhad an altar of St. Martin, was only 22 feet long. Theentrances to the porticus were from the nave, and a wall ranacross the western ends of each. There appears to be notrace of a western apse in this first church of Ethelbert.The eastern apse contained the altar of the Apostles Peterand Paul, and, as at Reculver and St. Pancras, was separatedfrom the nave by a triple arch divided by two columns. Thefloor was made of a hard red plaster. The church was con-secrated in 613 by Archbishop Laurence* on bis returnfrom his mission to the Scots and Irish, as both Thorn andThomas of Elmham tell us, in the presence of King Ethel-bert and a great cdncourse, and the body of St. Augustinewas brought in and buried in the north porch. At thesame time the bodies of Queen Bertha and her Chaplain,Bishop Letard, which also had been temporarily interredwithout, as the church was not consecrated at the time oftheir deaths, were brought in and buried in the south porchof St. Martin.

Gotselinf tells us that St. Augustine was buried in thenorth porch in the south-east corner between the altar ofSt. Gregory, which was in the centre of the east wall of thelittle chapel, and the parti-wall which separated it fromthe nave; that his feet touched the eastern wall, and that atMs head there was a small altar just east of the door in thesouth wall.

Letard was buried on the north side of the southernporch of St. Martin, i.e., the side nearest to the nave, in thesame relative position as St. Augustine, and a small altarstood at his head. The more honourable place opposite to

* Thorn ool. 1767 ; T. of B., p. 131 (ed, Hardvrick).t Hist. Trans. S. Aug., i. 17 ; ii., 28.

H 2

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him on the south side of St. Martin's altar was left forEthelbert, and Bertha was buried in the south-west cornerbehind her husband's future tomb.

Gotselin* describes how, when the fallen masonry wagremoved in the course of Abbot Wydo's translation of theSaints in 1091, " there was visible the tomb of .St. Angus?tine made of brick or tile, with a representation of Our Lordin glory with angels round him wonderfully wrought"; anda little further on,f when the tomb was opened, the body ofthe saint was found " intact lying in chasuble, alb, stole, withstaff, sandals and other episcopal ornaments, looking as ifhe were still alive, touch only revealing his condition."

The body! was removed with all honour to a place infront of the altar of the two apostles until a new restingplace could be prepared. §Every particle of the originaltoinb was removed, but on the site was built one of thepillars of the northern arcade, made partly out of the bricksof which the original tomb was composed, this pillar beingthe third from the central tower. This -pillar, so carefullydescribed for the benefit of posterity by Gotselin, and itsposition with regard to the other tombs, is the key to thewhole story.

In the new Norman church, || of which, Scotland hadalready built the eastern part, Augustine, as the master ofthe house, occupied the front or principal portions (i.e., the,eastern apse) with Laurence on the north of him and Mellituson the south, his head being just behind the altar of theHoly Trinity.

The high altar of the church was dedicated (as may beseen in the picture in the Trinity Hall MS. of Thomas ofElmham) to the two Apostles and St. Augustine, the altarin the central apse to the Holy Trinity, that in the northernapse to the Holy Innocents, and that in the south apse tothe Holy Deacons, Stephen, Laurence and Vincent. For allthese details connected with the Translation in 1091 Gotselinis a first-hand witness, but he does not relate a further

* Tfi.it. Trans. 8. Aug., i., 3. t Ibid., I, 10.J Ibid., I, II. ' § Ibid. i.3 29 || Hid., i., 24.

IN ST. AUSTIN'S ABBEY. 101

story which he may have known, but which could not bementioned till long after. So we find it in Thorn,* whotells us how Wydo, who completed the new church whichScotland had begun, and translated the bodies of the Saintsin 1091, on the 6th of September "translated the body ofSt. Augustine from the place where "he had lain for 500years, and laid to rest all his larger bones and head in astone tomb, carefully fastened with iron and lead, bearingthis inscription:—

'Here in the body lies Saint Augustine, the noble and holypatron of the English, and their glory on high.'

And because of the constant inroads of the Danes andNorthmen on the Kentish coast, which threatened to deprivenot only Kent but all England of its treasure, as soon asthe ceremonies of the translation had been finished and allthe people had gone home, the venerable Abbot, with someof the older brethren, went secretly by night to the tomb ofSt. Augustine, and after removing the cover, which was notyet perfectly fixed, they lifted out the body of St. Augustinewith the head, leaving only some few little bones and partof the ashes, and hid 'the aforesaid body in a stone coffinprepared for this purpose in the wall under the eastei'nwindow near his shrine. Only a few of the brethren knewof this, and they concealed it with such great secrecy thatwhen some had died the memory of what was done almostperished with them. There the venerable body lay. hid,unknown to all for about 130 years, till the time of AbbotHugh III. in the year 1221. And lest the people flocking"together to venerate him should be defrauded of theirhope and desire, the aforesaid Abbot Wydo enclosed theremainder of the bones, though small, and his ashes in aleaden vessel and buried it in the lowest part of the stoneliase of the shrine. But on the top of the silver shrine in aquite small leaden vessel he placed again a particle of fleshiiot yet entirely reduced to dust, but like dust moistenedwith clotted blood."

* Col. 1793-4.

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"In the year 1168,* on the day of the beheading of.St. John the Baptist, the greater part of the church wasburnt, and the shrines of St. Augustine and of many otherSaints were sadly disfigured."

"In the year 1221,f on the 27th of April, John Marsh,Priorof St. Augustine of Canterbury, with the seniors of the house,desiring to know where the body of the Blessed Augustine,the apostle of the English and his patron, had been laid,after fasting and vigils with prayer and mortification, onthe advice of certain brethren to whom a revelation hadbeen made thrice, ordered the wall to be broken near thealtar of St. Augustine in the eastern part under the middlewindow, and there was found the stone coffin, carefullysealed with iron and lead, bearing the inscription givenabove. On the morrow after solemn service, as was fitting,,after compline at the bidding of the Prior, the silver shrinewas removed by some of the brethren, and the altar and allthe stone work on which the shrine stood was broken upwith the view of improving and beautifying it. In themiddle of it in the lowest part of the stone base wasfound a great leaden vessel nearly 7 feet long, with tbis-inscription:—

' Here is contained part of the bones and ashes of !St, Augus-tine, Apostle of the English, who was of old sent by St. Gregoryand converted the English race to the faith of Christ.'

His precious head and larger bones G-uido. the Abbothonourably translated in another stone coffin, as a leadeninscription placed with these bones shows, in the year of theIncarnation of Our Lord 1091. The stone coffin containingthe head and larger bones was solemnly taken in processionby the Abbots of Battle and Langdon, and the Priors ofSt. Edmund's, of Faversham and of St. Radegund's, to thehigh altar, and there watched continuously by. four monks,until the return of Abbot Hugh III. from an embassy toKing Louis VIII. of Prance. On his return the remain^were, "by divine inspiration," again buried with all honour

* Col. 1815. f Col. 1876.

IN ST. AUSTIN'S ABBEY. 103

in three separate places, but the relative positions wer6changed. The greater part, which had been formerly conrcealed in the wall, was now put 011 high in a silver shrinestrongly bound with iron and carefully sealed with lead.The second part, .the lesser bones which had been in the"base of the tomb, were now put under a marble tomb, andthe third part (presumably the leaden vessel which had beeAat the top of the shrine) was now put under the centrewindow in the eastern part of the church, where, throughthe merits of the Saint, a boy once received his sight.* .Butat the instance of the great personages present and to kindlethe devotion of the people, Abbot Hugh had the head keptoutside the shrine, and enclosed at his own cost in a reliquaryof gold and silver and precious stones wonderfully wrought."

On 30 July 1300 Abbot Fyndon restored and added tothe inscription on the tomb.

In 1526 Cardinal Wolsey gave King John of Portugalsome relics of St. Augustine, viz., the chin-bone and three'teeth, which in 1628 were taken to the Cistercian church ofSt. Salvator at Antwerp.

What happened to the shrine at the Dissolution we donot know. In the excavations prior to 1907 some boneswere discovered on tlie site of the chapel of the HolyTrinitj', but there was no clue to their identity, and theywere reburied in the Tudor Lady Chapel.

In the Letters and Papers of the reign of Henry VIII.)arranged and catalogued by Dr. Gairdner and Mr. Brodie(vol. xviii., pai-t 2, p. 30), there is an interesting entry aboutthe shrine as follows, taken from a MS. (No. 128) in theLibrary of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, quoted inArch. Cant., XXVL, 841.

At the Visitation at Chilham the Vicar, named Dr. Wil-loughby, and one of the King's Chaplains, was asked:— .

''Why lie. having special commandment by the King's lettersfrom Hull doth yet keep in his church a certain shrine gilted

* Could this at some later time before the Dissolution have been removedand buried in a chapel .on the south, of the nave, where we have dug up a stone'enclosing a leaden cylinder with some unknown substance within ?

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pained St. Austin's shrine; which shrine was conveyed fromSt. Austin's in Canterbury unto the parish church of Chilham atf:he suppression of the Monastery of St. Austin's."

On p. 319, xi., a paper headed by Cranmer '^Dr. Wil-Joughby " gives the answer:—

" My lord as concerning the schryne I had never commandmentto pull hit down, and also hit his bot anente thenke [it is but anempty thing] ; bot Master Thwattes had it at Sent Astens andgave hit to the cherche."

Dr. Willoughby was the chief instrument in what Burnet.̂nd Strype call the conspiracy against Cranmer in 1543,

which came to nothing. It looks as if Dr. Willoughby hadbrought away the shrine to preserve it for better times, butwhen questioned had removed the bones and declared it wasonly an empty thing. He would never have set up a mereempty shrine, so possibly the bones may be somewhere atjOhilham.

Queen Bertha's place of interment has been already^stated. She predeceased her husband, who at his deathdesired to be buried near her. Her epitaph as given byWeever was: " Here lies the blessed Queen Bertha, admiredfor her character, pleasing to God and well beloved of men."

The exact date of Letard's death is unknown, but, as hasbeen said, Gotselin tells us exactly where his grave was inthe porticus of St. Martin.

Bang Ethelbert himself, as Bede* tells us, died on the24th day of February 616, twenty one-f years after he hadreceived the faith, and was buried in St. Martin's porticuswithin the Church of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul,where also his queen Bertha was buried. His epita.ph,swhich is preserved by Thomas of Blmham, has a strangejingle, which is difficult to reproduce in intelligible English.'Weever translates it thus—" King Ethelbertlieth here, closed in this polyander (i.e., cemetery).For building churches, sure he goes to Christ without meander."

* Bede, Hist. Seel., ii., 5.t Sit>, there is a doubt as to the figures, which are wrong.

IF ST. AUSTIN'S ABBEY. 105

We have no other record of any other burials in thisportions of St. Martin, for Edbald and his successors werefirst buried in St. Mary's Church.

What happened to this porticus in 1091 we cannot say.There were relics of Ethelberfc and Letard above the highaltar, but we know no more.

Laurence, the second archbishop, who had consecratedthe church of St. Peter and St. Paul and had reconvertedEdbald the son of Ethelbert, who had seized his father'ssecond wife and abjured Christianity, died on 2 February619, and, as Bede* says, was buried in the church andmonastery of the Holy Apostle Peter close by his predecessorAugustine. Gotselin tells us how he was on the north sideof the altar of St. Gregory parallel with Augustine, andthat St. Gregory was like a Eoman patrician at his owntable with his two eldest sons on either hand. Laurence'stomb, which was out of the line of the later Normanfoundations, has been happily left for us, showing where atthe south-west corner his body was removed in 1091 to beplaced in his new shrine on the north of Augustine's.

Mellitus, the third archbishop, who succeeded Laurenceafter being Bishop of London, consecrated Edbald's churchof St. Mary, and after reigning for five years was buried, asBedef says, in the monastery and church of the most blessedprince of the apostles on 24 April 624. Gotselin tells usnow his grave was immediately to the west of his prede-cessor Laurence, and it is there to be seen with the hole inits southern side, whence the body was taken in 1091.Justus, Bishop of Eochester, succeeded, and after consecra-ting Paulinus as Bishop on 21 July 625 to accompanyEthelburga, the daughter of Ethelbert, to Northuinbria tomarry King Edwin, he died on 10 November 627 and washonourably buried, as we know from Gotselin, immediatelywest of Mellitus, with his head against :the west wall of theporticus, where we have found his grave. As on the southof him Honorius and Deusdedit. were buried afterwards, in

* Bede, But. Eccl., ii., 17.t Hid., ii., 7. ,

106 TOMBS OP THE KINGS AND ARCHBISHOPS

order to open his tomb in 1091 part of the north wall o£ theporticus was cut away, as may now be seen.

Honorius, who succeeded him, was consecrated by Pauli-nus at Lincoln, and on 80 September 653 was buried to thesouth of Justus. His tomb was removed in 1091 to makeway for the new big sleeper or foundation wall of the northarcade of the Norman church. South of him again layFrithona, the first English archbishop, a Saxon fromWessex, who succeeded Honorius after a vacancy of eighteenmonths, and on his consecration by Itha-mar, Bishop ofRochester in 655, took-the name of Deusdedit.

Deusdedit and Brconbert, king of Kent, were both cutoff on 14 July 664 by the yellow pestilence, and the See ofCanterbury remained vacant four years—Wighard, one ofDeusdedit's clergy who had been sent to Rome in 667 forconsecration, having died there of pestilence, and Theo-dore only arriving in 669. Deusdedit's tomb, like that ofHonorius, was removed for the Norman foundation wallin 1091.

This completed the first series of interments in theporticus of St. Gregory: Augustine to the south of the altar,Laurence to the north ; behind Laurence, Mellitus ; behindMellitus, Justus; to the south of Justus, Honorius, and tothe south of Honorius, Deusdedit, between whose feet andthe altar at the head of Augustine was the opening into the-nave of the church.

When in 690 Theodore died, Bede* tells us he was buriedin St. Peter's Church (i.e., the abbey), but he and his.successor Brithwald alone were buried in the nave, because-the aforesaid porticus could contain no more. Thomas ofBlmham adds that his grave was in the nave, only separatedfrom that of Augustine by the internal wall. This probablywas broken up with that of Augustine to make way for the-new Norman work in 1091, as we have found no trace of it-Grotselinf tells us that at his translation his body, like thatof Augustine, clothed in his monastic habit and wearing-

* Bede, Hist. Heel., v., 8; ii., 3.t Sist. Trans. S. Aug., ii., 27.

IN ST. AUSTIN'S ABBEY. 107

the metropolitical pall, was found in perfect preservation,.Brithwald, the abbot of Reculver, who succeeded him in692, was Archbishop for 37 years,: and on his death in 731*was probably buried in the church behind Theodore andwest of the door into the porticus. The south side of atomb of Eoman brick which we have found may have-been his.

He was succeeded in the same year 731 by Tatwin, a'.1

Mercian priest of Bredon in "Worcestershire. He died on31 July 735 and was buried, as Thomas of Elmhamf says,with his holy predecessors, but we have no clue to the exactsite. It seems likely that he was buried in the nave alongwith his two predecessors, with whom, as Gotselin says, he7

was translated in 1091, but possibly to the west of theoriginal porticus.

Nothelm, arch-priest of St. Paul's, London, who hadvisited Rome and there gathered information for Bede, was.the next primate, but after a short episcopate died on,17 October 740. Possibly on account of his visit to Romeand of the letters of St. Gregory which he brought out ofthe archives there,J he was buried under the altar of St.Gregory in the north porticus,§ whence, as Gotselin tells us,,he was translated in 1091.

Then came a break. When Archbishop Cuthbert died in758 the hitherto undisputed right of the abbey to be the-burying-place of the Archbishops was challenged. Cuthbert,who had built to the south-east of his Cathedral an octagonalchapel of St. John the Baptist, desired to be buried in it>and on his death-bed called together his household and themonks of Christ Church and bound them by an oath not to-ring the bells or hold the usual funeral services until hisbody had been soaie days in the tomb. This was done, and.it was not till the third day after his' death that it was-publicly announced and the bells rung. - When, therefore,Abbot Aldhun and his monks came to the cathedral to fetchthe body of the archbishop for burial in the abbey, they

* T. of E., p. 286; Bede, Hist. Eccl, v., 23. f- T. of E., p. 311.t Bede, Pref. § T. of E., p. 312; Hist. Tram. S. Aug., ii., 25.

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iad to return empty handed notwithstanding their vehementprotests.*

Bregwin, the next Archbishop, followed Cuthbert's•example, but on his death in 762, when Jambert, the 10th.abbot of St. Augustine's, was preparing an appeal 'to Homeag-ainst this second infraction of the rule, he was himself•elected Archbishop and the appeal dropped.f But thoughhe took care that his own interment should be in the abbeywhere all his -sainted predecessors rested, he was the lastarchbishop to be buried there. He lived to the age of 94•and was buried in 789, and Gotselin* tells us that so greatwas his humility that he judged himself unworthy to beburied in the church of the saints and in the company•of such holy bishops as his predecessors, and ordered thathe should be buried in the chapter-house of the brethren'near his predecessor Augustine. (The word in the Latin iscapitoHo (i.e., capitulo), the chapter-house. Many of thelater abbots were buried in the 'later chapter-house, but wehave no other mention of the pre-Conquest chapter-house..If we could read cemeterio instead of capitolio the positionwould then be cleai-, for just outside the povticus east ofSt. Augustine's tomb was the cemetery on which Wulfricbuilt his work, but we have no authority for doing so, as the.MS. has capitolio twice quite clearly.)

This completes our record of the tombs in the originalabbey church, but there are still the tombs of those royalpersonages afterwards included in it, who were first buriedin the oratory or chapel of the Holy Mother of God, foundedin 618 by Bdbald in expiation of his sins and endowed withthe royal manor of Northbourne. This chapel was a fewyards to the east of the Church of St. Peter and St. Pauland separated from it by the monks' cemetery. In this•chapel was buried in 640 JBdbald and his wife Einma, the•daughter of Theodebert, king of Lorraine; his son and.successor Erconbert and his wife Sexburga in 664 ; Breon-fcert's eldest son Egbert in 673, and his younger son

* T. of E., p. 317: • • t Mit., p. 318,£ Sist. Trans. S. Aug., ii., 26 ; T. of E., p. 33£.

Royal Tombs in South transept.

Royal Tombs in South transept against South wall.First on left Kilbald, next Lothaire, next Withred, and last, ashes of Mulus .

ST. AUGUSTINE'S ABBEY.

IN ST. AUSTIN'S ABBEY. . 1091

Lothaire in 685; and Egbert's son Wihtred, .who succeededhis uncle Lothaire and died in 725. "Wihtred left threesons, Eadbert, Ethelbert II. and Alric, as heirs of his.kingdom, of whom Thomas of Elmham* .says that Ethelbertwas; buried in this church, and seems to imply that he was-the last king to be buried there.

There were also many abbots buried there, but they donot concern our present subject.

Gotselinf tells us how, when Abbot Scotland demolishedSt. Mary's Church to make way for his new church, " there-were also four kings with their royal consorts and childrenand a long sti-ing of .descendants."

Of these he particularizes four: Edbald, Lothaire, Mulusor Wulf, brother of Cad walla, king of the West Saxons, and:Wihtred. A little further onj he describes how, " with theother bodies taken out of St. Mary's, which were removed ina solemn procession and temporarily laid in the western,tower of the minster before the altar of the Holy Mother ofGod until the new church was built and they could beburied again \vith new honours, were these four kings afore-mentioned, with their wives and descendants."

So far the chronicle. The excavations continue thestory. In the western tower we found seven graves, withsome children's graves. The children's graves containedbones; but only in one of the full-sized graves, one withinwhich was a child's grave, were there any bones. Werethese the temporary graves ? Finally last year we found, aswas recorded in the papers, against the south wall ofthe south transept, one behind the other with little shaftsbetween each grave, four grav.es. The easternmost had beenpillaged and destroyed, and there was only the floor. Thenext, of which the floor and part of the back and sides-remained, a very shallow grave, contained some bones not inorder and a small leaden plate, 2-| in. by 2 in., bearing thisinscription in Latin : "Here lies Lotharius, king of theEnglish. He died on Feb. 6th in the year 685." As there.

* T. of E., p. 327.'' t Hist. Trans. 8. Aug., ii., 7.J Hid., ii., J13. ;

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not quite enough room on the front of the plate, the•date of the year was continued on the back. In the third•tomb, of which part of the front plinth and more of the"back and side remain, were more bones and another plate, alittle larger, 3 -̂ in. by 2T\- in., with this inscription, all on•one side: "Here lies Wihtred, king- of the English. He•died on April 24 in the year 725." The fourth grave, ofwhich the plinth is p'e'rJect, had no bones, but only a fewashes in the gravel with which, like the others, it had beenfilled. This may well have been the ashes of Mulus, the"West Saxon king, who, after ravaging the country, was•defeated in battle, surrounded in a wooden hut, in which hehad taken refuge, by the men of Kent, and burnt alive.We know from the " Saxon Chronicle " that Ina, king of"Wessex, exacted a heavy blood fine, and probably alsoinsisted on due funeral honours being rendered to his kins-anan, which may be the reason why his ashes were buriedwith the kings of Kent.

The emphasis laid by Gotselin on these four kings, the•character of the two inscriptions and of the bases of the3i'ttle shafts dividing the tombs, seem to warrant the con-clusion that the other two graves are those of Edbald andof the ashes of Mulus, and that we have in them the finalTesting places of these four kings buried first in St. Mary's,•then in the eleventh century temporarily removed to thewestern tower, and then finally buried in the south transeptin the early twelfth century.

There is in the centre of the south transept the base of aflbig table tomb with apparently no grave below. Whose itmay be we cannot say. -There are also three tombs in a rowin the north-west corner of the transept. There is also in-the centre of St. Anne's chapel to the west of the southtransept, beside Juliana de Laybourne's tomb on the northiside of the chapel, a double grave, one above another, but tothis, too, we have no-clue. Where were Bertha and Ethelbertrand Letard finally transferred ?

Some relics of the two latter were above the highaltar, but where were their graves ? Could they also have

IN ST. AUSTIN'S ABBEY. Ill

been in the south transept, the centre of the royal burialchapel ?

A heraldic Visitation of Kent, 1530-31, printed in 1923in London, gives some further information as to the royaltombs in the south transept. Under "St. Augustine'sMonastery, Canterbury," is the following note:—

" Saynte Ethelbert, ffurste ffownder of the Monasterye ofSaynt Augustyne's in Canterbury, lyeth JBuryecle on the highAuter in the said Monasterie, his sone King Edbalde and his wifelyeth in Saynte .Toftes Chappell in the Sowth syde of the saidChurche and withowte the said chapell dore lyeth kynge Ercon-bert, with eausyd lente to be kepte, King Lothary lyeth next andthen Kynge Mawle and then Kyug Wytthred; also Julian Lay-borne, Counties of Huntyngdon, lyeth buried in Saynt Anne'schapell. In the churche aforesaide the same Saynt Ethelbert wasalso furst fownder of thys churche of Canterbury and also fownderof Eochester Abbey and fi'urst ffiownder of Powlles in London."

This description, written less than ten years before thedissolution of the monastery, is particularly interesting.We know from Thorn (col. 1769) that Edbald and his wifeEmma were finally bui'ied near the altar of St. John. Thornalso (col. 1783) tells us that Elmer the Abbot, afterwardsBishop of Sherborne, who, on becoming blind, resigned hisSee and came back to end his days in his old monastery,was buried opposite the altar of St. John, and the Augus-tinian Chronicle, in noting his election to the See of Sher-borne in 1022, adds: "He lies in a tomb outside theenclosure (clausura) of the altar of St. John."

This altar may well have been that in the apse on theeast side of the south transept. There is remaining a parti-wall which may have formed part of the clausura running afew feet across the transept, and the big foundation just tothe north of it may have been the tomb of Erconbert andhis wife Sexburga, and somewhere near may have been thatof Bishop Elmer. But it seems clear that the southern partof the south transept formed the chapel of St. John.

The Visitation account, which is obviously not .very exact,puts the four graves in a different order, viz., Edbald and

112 TOMBS IN ST. AUSTIN'S ABBEY.

Emma, 'Lothaire, Ma.wle, and then Withred. We found thespace of Edbald's grave empty; then came Lothaire, withhis bones and tablet; then Withred, with his bones andtablet^ and finally some ashes and no tablet. The presenceof the tablets in the graves, which had not been previouslydisturbed, is stronger evidence than the herald's note.

The original inscriptions' on the tablets, of which photo-graphs are given, are as follows:—

HIC BEQVIES Continuederr i/OTHARiv1 on theBEX : ANGLOU' : reverseVIII-IDVS . TEB : ANN . DC

OBIIT : AN . DC LXXX . V

HIC EEQVIESCITWIHTIUSDVS : BEXANGLOE' : VIII-KLD :MAI . OBIIT . ANNO. DCC . xx . v .

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Coffin plate of King Lothaire (obverse and reverse).

Coffin Plate of K i n g \Vithred.

ST. .U 'crsTIN'E 'S A l ' . M K Y .